Darker Nights
by SydnieWren
Summary: Home from a mission, Ichigo suffers a nightmare. Urahara is there to give him what he needs. UraxIchi. Anal.


**Hey guys! So my UraxIchi stories seem to be pretty well appreciated, and I'm really glad! I have a lot of fun writing them and am thinking of making them something of a series. I'm basically incapable of writing multi-chaptered stories, so expect a series of oneshots. **

**Ferler - I am glad to have helped out with your cruddy day with the other pieces! Hopefully this one is just as good.**

**As always, please keep the reviews coming; they are really helpful!**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing**

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Urahara was not waiting for Ichigo.

There was no question about it.

He was merely leaning on the counter as per usual, reading a magazine, fanning himself now and again, watching the shop long after the others had gone to sleep and the streets had subsided to dimly-lit, barren silence. It was late to be sure, a good four hours past the shop's typical closing time, but Urahara loved to mix things up - and besides, one never knew when a new customer would wish to drop in.

Urahara's eyes flickered nervously to the glass door, seeking out any sign of motion.

He was not waiting for Ichigo.

He just desperately wanted him there.

Of course, he understood that the boy could and had handled difficult missions and that he was capable of work that lesser captains would struggle with. There was just enough stubborn resolve in the boy to push him through nearly every perilous situation he found himself in, but Urahara knew well enough that there were some circumstances that bypassed all determination. There were certain games that could not be won.

There was fate.

He sighed frustratedly and closed his magazine, rising to pace the shop as he had done intermittently for the past hours. The boy had been gone for three days, and from what Urahara had managed to gather from Yoruichi, they had overshot the estimated duration of the mission by an entire day. She assured him that it wasn't uncommon for mission estimates to be completely off in both directions, though he personally didn't recall them being so sloppy.

There were no headlights glinting in the windows, no roaming bands of teenagers laughing and carrying on, not even a drunk wandering by in the moonlight. It seemed to Urahara that the world beyond the shop was entirely dead, frozen in time with no promise of birdsong or sunlight. The lack of sound and motion drove him almost to madness; he was anxious enough already, incredibly tense, drinking glass after glass of water just to fill his time, just to stay awake.

For a time, he sat soberly against the wall behind the counter, and contemplated the worst. Wounds were fine. Wounds, he could handle. Wounds could heal. Let him be gone a hundred days if it meant the fourth division could send him back whole and healthy. Let there be scars, let there be bruises, let him be marked from head to toe if it meant he walked and talked and laughed again. Urahara knew he would make love to the boy no matter what, no matter the altered flesh, the care he would have to take. And if every scar was on the inside, then let him be healed by gentler, wiser hands than the fourth had to offer.

Death was final.

Urahara raked his fingers through his hair and wrapped his arms around his knees, leaning heavily on them.

If the boy never again walked through that door - he couldn't contemplate it, could barely conceive of it, his mind would not let him consider it for lack of strength. He was too exhausted to expend the last traces of his mental energy on a possibility that wrenched every last bit of vitality from him.

He stood suddenly and grasped the counter's metal edge, staring intently at the still door as though mimicking his expected reaction would tempt fate into mercy.

But there was nothing.

Urahara sighed heavily and leaned down again, crossing his forearms on the glass countertop and resting his forehead against them. He felt impossibly heavy, weighted, subdued by the silent, still night.

He thought of the last time they had made love. It had not been remarkable - no new techniques introduced, no novel positions or deviations from the ordinary. It had been a send-off for a mission they both believed would be a short one. He had laid Ichigo down in his bed, and he distinctly remembered how soft he had felt, his smooth skin, the way he had let Urahara explore and adore his body with no posturing, no fighting. It had been very honest: Urahara had kissed, touched, filled him, and Ichigo had caressed, nuzzled, accepted him.

Nothing out of the ordinary. They had napped briefly afterward and then shared a kettle of tea. Ichigo had not limped and Urahara had not stumbled, they had both been fine, everything was fine.

Presently Urahara would have given anything for a promise that he would have that again. He would have sworn, if asked, that he would never tease or rib the boy again, would never introduce him to another deviant act, would never let him out of his sight without a kiss and -

The bell above the door sounded its opening, and Urahara stood bolt upright.

In the doorway, sagging slightly, still in black haori and hakama, was Ichigo. There were traces of dried sweat and dirt on his skin, and in a few places, flaking blood. But he was alive, breathing, walking on his own accord, and Urahara felt he had never seen anything so beautiful.

"You look a bit worse for the wear, Kurosaki-kun," Urahara greeted, rounding the counter in record time. He wanted to embrace the boy so badly it made his chest ache, but he seemed unsure on his feet, and half-asleep where he stood, slightly swaying.

"Yeah..." he replied flatly.

"Well." Urahara gently held his upper arms, peering into his weary face. There was something lacking in those brown eyes, a burnt out spark, an emptiness. "Let's get you cleaned up and off to bed."

Ichigo agreed wordlessly, following Urahara's gesture and trudging up the stairs. He moved as though wading through waist-high water; the blond trailed close behind him for fear that he may stumble. When they reached his room Ichigo momentarily stood aside, slowly undressing near the bathroom door. Urahara started the shower, warm enough to soothe, and stacked a washcloth and towel on the countertop.

The boy stepped beneath the warm spray and bowed his head, eyes drifting shut. After a moment, Urahara noticed that he hadn't closed the door, perhaps expecting that he would be joined as usual. But the blond was well aware that Ichigo needed more from him than a shower partner at the moment, and that he needed to gather his thoughts, tend his wounds in private. Urahara gently closed the shower door, and promised to be back momentarily.

Ichigo did not protest.

Downstairs, he filled a glass of water and stood for a minute over the sink, reflecting on the boy upstairs. He could hear the water run, a gentle rushing in the pipes, and he wondered what was being washed along with it - filth, dirt, blood.

He climbed the stairs and slipped back into his room, locking the door behind him. The water waned and then shut off, and Ichigo emerged from the shower, unfolding the towel to dry himself. The process was much less vigorous than usual; typically he shook his hair out and went about drying his skin like he was scrubbing it down, but for the moment he only ran the towel cursorily over his hair, and wrapped himself in it.

The bathroom light shut off behind him, and he moved sluggishly into the bedroom, dropping the towel to his waist. Urahara sat on the edge of the bed and beckoned him over. When Ichigo dropped beside him with an audible sigh, he offered him the water, and the boy gratefully downed it.

"Any injuries?" Urahara inquired softly.

"No," Ichigo shook his head absently and handed the glass back to the blond, who settled it on the night table.

He figured they had healed him before letting him go. _Considerate of them_, he thought bitterly.

Ichigo silently moved into place in bed; Urahara noted that he seemed to be favoring his right side. The boy faced away from him, toward the wall, and unsteadily tugged the blankets up over his body, to the shoulder. Reaching beneath the bedside lamp, he eliminated the last remainder of light in the room, leaving only watery rays of moonlight hazily spilling through the window.

Slowly, gingerly, giving the redhead ample time to refuse, Urahara draped his arm over his lover, careful not to place too much pressure on him. It was paradise to have the firm back and sharp adolescent shoulder blades against him again, rising and falling weakly with breath.

"Does that hurt?" Urahara whispered, hoping to avoid any bruises or aches.

But the boy was already asleep.

At length, Urahara followed him into sleep, though a light one, void of dreams.

Thus, he was not hard pressed to wake when he sensed a distinct trembling beneath his arm - Ichigo's shoulders, quivering. It was clear that the boy was trying to hide his sobbing; his muscles were unbearably tense against Urahara, and he had brought his hand up to cover his mouth and nose. Of all the things Ichigo was, the blond thought, shinigami, student, guardian, lover - he was chiefly a fifteen-year-old boy.

He did not want to be seen crying.

Sensitive to that fact, Urahara laid still for long moments, waiting for the shaking in Ichigo's shoulders to subside. When the trembling dwindled to periodic lurches, and the muffled sounds of smothered sobs to weak and shallow breathing, he pressed his lips against the nape of the boy's neck, and softly tightened his hold on his waist.

"Bad dream?" he whispered.

Ichigo nodded but did not speak, stubbornly refusing to offer any evidence of his tears.

"We all get them," Urahara offered gently, "I used to get them so often I'd try not to sleep." He paused, stroking the boy's abdomen soothingly. "After a while, you'll have them less and less."

And he was not sure if it was a good thing, that inevitable desensitization to all manner of bloodshed and misery, but he knew that it could not be avoided.

After long moments of that gentle stroking, during which Urahara kissed his shoulder and murmured comforting words into his ear, Ichigo was lulled into a familiar calm, his breathing returning to normal, tears drying.

But there was a need in him then, born of desperation and nursed by Urahara's gentle touches. The urge was stronger than anything he had ever felt before, almost uncontrollable - he wanted to feel Urahara's hands all over him, wanted to feel him buried inside, to be assured that he was living and breathing and feeling, that somewhere in the world, there was peace for him, safety. A moment's reprieve.

Urahara felt the boy's fingers close gingerly over his own, drawing his hand downward, to rest over his sex, fingertips just barely brushing the exceedingly soft flesh. Ichigo was not hard, but he pushes his hips pleadingly into Urahara's palm, and the blond understood his need. There were times, he knew, when life had to be reaffirmed, one's place in the world anchored with the assurance that they were wanted, loved, desperately needed; that their actions, however violent or detestable, were, at least in one place, excused.

With preternatural tenderness, Urahara stroked Ichigo to hardness, savoring every trembling breath and roll of his hips, even the gooseflesh that rose along his arms and shoulders. All the while, he kissed the boy's neck, just where the bright red strands subsided to downy-soft wisps, an action that had Ichigo craning his neck to allow more access.

Urahara had every intention of stroking Ichigo to climax, holding him close and providing him that reassurance and release that would lull him into a peaceful sleep. But the moment the boy felt his lover's sex pressed against him, hard and growing harder, he spread his legs in suggestion.

"Ichigo," Urahara's warm breath flowed tantalizingly over his neck, "do you really feel up to this? Now?"

He was rewarded with a sharp buck against his arousal and a firm nod. The boy still didn't trust himself to speak without a tear-stained or cracked voice; his body did every bit of begging he meant to.

Urahara released the boy's sex just as that warm, clear fluid began to drip down his knuckles, wringing a half-muffled whine from him. Given his state - the urgency of his need - the blond did not tease him. He leaned away for a moment, drenching his fingers in lubrication before returning to the boy, sliding one arm beneath him, embracing him from behind. He then gently probed his fingers between the boy's thighs, urging them open as he trailed them toward his entrance.

Ichigo gasped audibly and arched his back as Urahara's hesitant fingers found his passage, that rosy ring of flesh suddenly aching for touch. He grasped the blond's arm, lacing their fingers tightly, white-knuckled, as one of those fingers pressed inside of him, followed nearly immediately by another, slick, insistent - a sensation that Ichigo had grown intimately familiar with, something Urahara fully intended. The boy's eyes fell shut under the ecstasy of his lover's singular touch, that easy stroking that was so firmly imprinted upon his sexuality.

"Kisuke..." he rasped, and it could have been the remnants of tears or the onslaught of pleasure that made his tone so pleading, so desperate.

"Almost, Ichigo," the blond breathed.

When the boy's muscles finally yielded to his probing, Urahara withdrew his fingers and slid his hand beneath the boy's thigh, gently lifting it. His first thrust inside was smooth and firm, enough to draw out a moan from his throat; he knew that some would be terribly careful in his situation, but also that Ichigo needed something more intense, more genuine, with no trace of patronizing delicacy.

At once the boy thrust back against him, rocking his hips onto the hard flesh inside him, biting back his frantic panting.

"Take it easy," Urahara gasped, squeezing the boy's hand.

"Kisuke," Ichigo moaned, "ah - d-deeper!"

The penetration had been relatively shallow, something Urahara supposed would lengthen the encounter for both of them. But the moment Ichigo begged for him, he knew it was imperative - the boy needed that impossibly deep touch, that incredible pleasure at the core of his being that brought on orgasms too acute and electrifying to ever forget, the sort that impressed the memory of the moment on the mind forever.

Urahara's breath came in shallow gasps as he moved his hand downward, passing over the boy's abdomen to brace him just above his sex, pulling him tightly against him. Ichigo bucked, growled, trembled from the teasing - and then Urahara shifted his thigh up higher, and pushed inside to the hilt.

"Kisuke!" Ichigo cried, near-convulsing with the blinding ecstasy. It was precisely what he wanted, what he desperately_ needed_.

The blond's tempo sped and he was pressing his lips to those tense shoulders, barely in control of his own body; Ichigo was so hot, so tight -

He screamed and sucked in a sharp breath when Urahara's sex brushed firmly over that spot inside him that spread shattering bursts of white across his vision. Every fierce, deep thrust was almost too much, forcing from him an overpowering orgasm. Those tense muscles tightened around his lover and he brokenly called his name as he spread his legs open wide and bucked back onto him, spilling his seed.

Urahara was not far behind him. Ichigo's body pulsed erratically around him and he pressed in one last time as he groaned, the pleasure welling inside of him and flowing out into his lover.

When they regained their breath, Urahara found his hand comfortably tucked between the boy's closed thighs, his sex still buried inside, and the redhead showing every sign of drifting off to sleep.

"Better?" he whispered lightly, bringing his hand up to brush away a few strands of sweat-soaked red hair.

Ichigo nodded, again, Urahara suspected, incapable of speech.

But he was wrong.

"Just stay," Ichigo yawned, tugging the covers upward. "Or I'll...I'll kick..."

Dawn was only a pin's width from breaking over the horizon when Urahara's mind settled enough to follow the boy into sleep. He wanted things to be easier for Ichigo, for his heart to be less burdened by the endless destruction and long spiritual erosion of shinigamihood. But there always had to be protectors, guardians, brave members of the vanguard.

And they were a lonely, haunted lot.

But, Urahara thought, even when the worst darkness sank down over him, there was a bed for him to lay in, and arms to hold him, for as long as he needed to be held.

Not a single shinigami could ask for anything more.

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**As always, thanks for the read. Please review!**


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